Boxing Recap : Shingo Wake & Jonathan Guzman + Joseph Parker

This week saw two fights of public appeal which boxing fans were showing genuine interest. Firstly on Wednesday saw the IBF gain a new champion in the Super Bantamweight division. Thursday saw the New Zealand heavyweight march on with his eyes firmly set on UK’s Anthony Joshua.

The Main attraction from japan on Wednesdays was the highly anticipated bout between Shingo Wake of Japan and Panama’s Jonathan Guzman. We as fans if anything else was just glad to see the super bantamweight division at last take shape once again after carl Frampton decided to move up to featherweight and vacated his titles. Carl held the WBA and IBF world title and will now be challenging Leo Santa Cruz up at featherweight for LSC’s WBA “super” world featherweight title.

The bout in my opinion was one sided at times during the fight in favour of Guzman who made his breakthrough in the fight in round number two where he scored two big knockdowns . Each of the knockdowns was potential fight finishing punches and Shingo got up from both of these knockdowns and managed to survive the second round. The second round saw Guzman again demonstrate his power by scoring yet another knockdown of his Japanese opponent. But once again Shingo wake managed to get up and bravely thought on and survived the third round. However again in the fifth round Shingo Wake managed to find himself back on the canvas and was expecting the officials to say enough is enough. However Wake dusted himself off and continued to battle landing his success with punches making inroads into the fight but in reality he needed a stoppage by the start of 7. The fight continued till round 11 and that is when the referee stopped the action with wake in position to continue. Wake suffered terrible surface damage to the cheek which would have been hindering his vision. The fight in my eyes could have been stopped a little sooner but understandable that the referee allowed the home fighter to continue.

Guzman now completes the list of world champions at super bantamweight with Nonito Donaire the WBO champion, Hugo Ruiz the WBC, Guillermo Rigondeaux the WBA “super” champion, Nehomar Cermeno the WBA “regular” champion.

Thursday saw the growing in popularity Joseph Parker of New Zealand who fought in Christchurch, New Zealand against Solomon Haumono. The fight result went as expected with Parker securing a fourth round KO. However Haumono had his moment of success in the opening two rounds with over hand rights and hooks which caused swelling around the brow and cheek bone around Parker’s face. Joseph is still showing defensive frailties which will be his big downfall at world level and he will be reaching that level very quickly. Joseph is mandatory challenger to face Anthony Joshua for the IBF world heavyweight crown with that fight soon to be called to negotiate by the IBF or goes to purse bids.

Parker’s trainer Kevin Barry said Joseph’s next opponent will be revealed on Tuesday (July 26). So will be interesting to see who & where does the announcement. If it’s London with a media conference called for with Eddie Hearn and Matchroom sport then expect Anthony Joshua to face Parker. That is if Kevin Barry is correct with his information. Whoever parker faces next time out, he still has a lot of questions to answer .